Jordan between friends and enemies

The recent Mecca Summit which King Salman bin Abdulaziz called for near the holy site had one item on its agenda: standing with the Kingdom of Jordan.

The UAE and Kuwait responded to the Saudi invitation. Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Sabah Ahmad Al-Sabah, the UAE’s Vice President and Ruler of Dubai Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum and of course, Jordan’s King Abdullah II and Jordan’s Crown Prince Hussein were in attendance of the summit at the Safa Palace that overlooks the Kaaba.

The meeting succeeded in achieving its purpose. We all know about the “earthquake” that Jordan has recently been through, whose consequences still remain.

The solution and lessons learnt

Mecca’s antidote, Saudi Arabia’s invitation and the positive response from Kuwait and the UAE were the cold water that was poured over the coal of strife and over the goals of suspicious parties that plowed into the fire of worry by exploiting the difficult economic circumstances that Jordan is going through. By the way, one of the reasons behind this economic crisis is the bills resulting from the hideous Arab Spring.

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Aid worth $2.5 billion was allocated to support the Jordanian Dinar and support the government’s budget for the next five years. This is in addition to developmental and service-based projects, and the provision of guarantees to the World Bank on behalf of Jordan.

Is this enough to cure the root of the current problem? Experts say that what happened was a resuscitating injection in the vein to avoid the pains caused by the inevitable economic reform program, even if the government is ruled by the Islamic Action Front itself or Hammam Said or Laith Shubeilat or Yasser Abu Hilala.

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The lesson learnt from what happened these days, as the famous Jordanian author and politician Saleh Al-Qallab put it in his article in the Jordanian Al-Ra’i newspaper, is that the real depth of Jordan’s security lies south and not north of the kingdom! The real depth is in the Arabian Peninsula and its gulf, towards Saudi Arabia and its brothers in the Arab Gulf.

Prudence now requires inventorying friends from enemies and those who sought to worsen this chaos from those who worked to relieve Jordan and maintain its security. Jordan is a major pillar of real Arab security, it is not a foreigner!

‘May Allah reward adversities, as they enabled me to recognize my friend from my enemy!’

This article is also available in Arabic.

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Saudi journalist Mashari Althaydi presents Al Arabiya News Channel’s “views on the news” daily show “Maraya.” He has previously held the position of a managing senior editor for Saudi Arabia & Gulf region at pan-Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awsat. Althaydi has published several papers on political Islam and social history of Saudi Arabia. He appears as a guest on several radio and television programs to discuss the ideologies of extremist groups and terrorists. He tweets under @MAlthaydy.